An Evening With The Printers

Hey all,

I really don’t remember when we all (as in those who did come) went to the printers. What I do remember is that we had a fun evening and we learnt a lot at the same time. Here are some of the pictures that I took when we were at the printer’s place.

Cheers

Karthik

This was the major machine they had at the press. Pretty old but was working really well.

Sheets being printed… for an old machine, it was pretty fast. I really wondered then how the really fast machine like the news papers would print. The Hindu and The Times of India are said to have some really sophisticated machinery and some of the best in the world. And I was fascinated by these machines.

The parts of the machine that print blue and red. In their jargon, its cyan and magenta.

This person was our tour guide. He showed us around the press, explained things clearly and answered our questions patiently.

This is the place where the sheets are fed into the machine.

See what i meant by pretty old machine, this person had to apply ink every once in a while.

The inner workings of the press machine. They really weren’t inner because they were kept open and people were tweaking with it now and then.

Papers being printed.

Papers being printed.

These are something like negatives. They are called plates. See the white areas and printed areas. Thats how the papers are printed. Something like a rubber stamp kind but more complicated.

Aruna in front of a whole load of printed paper behind her. I think those were pamphlets for a computer parts shop or something like that.

Balaji with more printed papers behind him.

Hariharan holding up a plate for me.

Rollers used for printing… not these ones obviously. cleaner ones. you can see them in action in the first few pictures.

More of the rubber rollers.

Tasleem: “What’re you lookin at???”

Inside the computer room… this is where they get the source files and get the plates ready for printing.

This printing machine working on the same principles of the rubber stamp.

Thats Aruna urging the rest of us to start so that it wont look awkward if she starts alone. There’s Tasleem in the background looking out the window… Wonder who she’s looking at…